From The Marxist Archives -The Revolutionary History Journal-My First Steps Towards the Permanent Revolution

 

 

Book Review

Year One of the Russian Revolution-Victor Serge
I have read several books on subjects related to the Russian Revolution by Victor Serge and find that he is a well-informed insider on this subject although the novel rather than history writing is his stronger form of expressing his views. This book can be profitably read in conjunction with other better written left-wing interpretations of this period. Sukhanov's Notes on the Russian Revolution (for the February period), Leon Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution and John Reed's Ten Days that Shook the World come to mind.

The task Serge sets himself here is to look at the dramatic and eventually fateful events of first year of the Russian Revolution. Those included the Bolshevik seizure of power, the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly and the struggle by the Bolsheviks against other left-wing tendencies in defining Soviet state policy, the fight to end Russian participation in World War I culminating in the humiliating Brest-Litovsk treaty with Germany and, most importantly, the beginnings of Civil War against the Whites. In short, he investigates all the issues that will ultimately undermine and cause the degeneration of what was the first successful socialist seizure of state power in history.

Serge's history is partisan history in the best sense of the word. It is rather silly at this late date to argue that historians must be detached from the subject of their investigations. All one asks is that a historian gets the facts for his or her analysis straight. And try to stay out of the way. Serge passes this test. Serge worked under the assumption that the strategic theory of the Bolshevik leaders Lenin and Trotsky was valid. That premise stated Russia as the weakest link in the capitalist system could act as the catalyst for revolution in the West and therefore shorten its road to socialism. The failure of that Western revolution, the subsequent hostile encirclement by the Western powers and the inevitable degeneration implicit in a revolution in an economically undeveloped country left to its own resources underlies the structure of his argument.

The Russian revolution of October 1917 was the defining event for the international labor movement during most of the 20th century. Serious militants and left -wing organizations took their stand based on their position on the so-called Russian Question. At that time the level of political class-consciousness in the international labor movement was quite high. Such consciousness does not exist today where the socialist program is seen as Utopian. However, notwithstanding the demise of the Soviet state in 1991-92 and the essential elimination of the specific Russian Question as a factor in world politics anyone who wants learn some lessons from the heroic period of the Russian Revolution will find this book an informative place to start.

Click below to link to the Revolutionary History Journal index.

http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/backissu.htm

Peter Paul Markin comment on this series:

This is an excellent documentary source for today’s leftist militants to “discover” the work of our forebears, particularly the bewildering myriad of tendencies which have historically flown under the flag of the great Russian revolutionary, Leon Trotsky and his Fourth International, whether one agrees with their programs or not. But also other laborite, semi-anarchist, ant-Stalinist and just plain garden-variety old school social democrat groupings and individual pro-socialist proponents.

Some, maybe most of the material presented here, cast as weak-kneed programs for struggle in many cases tend to be anti-Leninist as screened through the Stalinist monstrosities and/or support groups and individuals who have no intention of making a revolution. Or in the case of examining past revolutionary efforts either declare that no revolutionary possibilities existed (most notably Germany in 1923) or alibi, there is no other word for it, those who failed to make a revolution when it was possible.

The Spanish Civil War can serve as something of litmus test for this latter proposition, most infamously around attitudes toward the Party Of Marxist Unification's (POUM) role in not keeping step with revolutionary developments there, especially the Barcelona days in 1937 and by acting as political lawyers for every non-revolutionary impulse of those forebears. While we all honor the memory of the POUM militants, according to even Trotsky the most honest band of militants in Spain then, and decry the murder of their leader, Andreas Nin, by the bloody Stalinists they were rudderless in the storm of revolution. But those present political disagreements do not negate the value of researching the POUM’s (and others) work, work moreover done under the pressure of revolutionary times. Hopefully we will do better when our time comes.

Finally, I place some material in this space which may be of interest to the radical public that I do not necessarily agree with or support. Off hand, as I have mentioned before, I think it would be easier, infinitely easier, to fight for the socialist revolution straight up than some of the “remedies” provided by the commentators in these entries from the Revolutionary History journal in which they have post hoc attempted to rehabilitate some pretty hoary politics and politicians, most notably August Thalheimer and Paul Levy of the early post Liebknecht-Luxemburg German Communist Party. But part of that struggle for the socialist revolution is to sort out the “real” stuff from the fluff as we struggle for that more just world that animates our efforts. So read, learn, and try to figure out the
wheat from the chaff. 
******** 

My First Steps Towards the Permanent Revolution

The following account was written by ‘Comrade P’, who was then a militant of the La Lutte group, but who has had no contacts with the Trotskyist movement since the 1940s and now lives in France. Its translation we owe to Comrade Simon Pirani, and the text was given to us for reproduction here by Comrade Ngo Van Xuyet.
It expresses the view of the La Lutte group (as opposed to the ICL to which belonged ‘Lucien’ (Lu Sanh Han) and Ngo Van, and whose basic document is reproduced in Our Position below). The La Lutte group, seeing no other possible policy due to the relationship of forces, gave critical support to the Vietminh Nam-bo Committee (cf. Paolo Conlon, Yet More on the Vietnamese Trotskyists, in Workers Press, 21 March 1987, answered by Simon Pirani, Looking at History with Blinkers On, Workers Press, 25 April 1987). It did not actually join the Vietminh government, as is so often stated, but it did agree to sit upon a commission set up to negotiate with the Allies when they landed in Saigon, which in the event never met. It was, so Comrade Ngo Van commented, “perhaps a bit like the behaviour of Stalin and Kamenev in February 1917” (Conversation with Al Richardson, 1 June 1990).
The La Lutte group criticised the ICL as being ‘sectarian’ (cf. Trotskyism in Vietnam in International Communist, no.7, March 1978, pp.49-51), and when the latter appeared on the great Saigon demonstration (cf. the account of Comrade Ngo Van Xuyet, above) the La Lutte group denounced it as follows:
“The La Lutte group, which has joined the Vietminh front, has made known that in the course of the demonstration of 25 August, a group of persons marching under the banner of the world revolution [a red flag bearing a globe crossed by a lightning flash] had sown confusion by its slogans. They declared that they had no links with these people.” (Journal de Saigon, no.17017, 28 August 1945). The La Lutte group, which later named itself the Socialist Workers Party, was much more numerous than the ICL. Differences widened in the exile in France, where the ICL adopted a state capitalist analysis of the Soviet Union. The exiles in France belonged to both tendencies, but were not divided into two organisations over basic questions as they had been in Vietnam.

*****************

I was then 17 years old. Japanese imperialism had undergone a defeat, and the French were despoiled, under guard and concentrated) in various large towns. The old political leaders were returning from deportation and the extermination camps. Saigon, my birthplace, was able to breathe its first breaths of freedom normally for the first time. Such was the political situation in Saigon on the day I joined the Trotskyist La Lutte group.
After an absence of eight years, La Lutte, the organ for the defence of the working class, made its reappearance before the Saigon public. In a few days the number of papers brought out climbed to dizzy heights. Three editions a day were not enough for the workers and the Saigon public. [1] The Stalinist organisations, on the one hand preoccupied with the question of taking power, and having on the other already been defeated by the Trotskyists at the time of the election campaigns of 1936-37, no longer had the time to carry out work among the factory workers and toilers in the towns. Since the first days of political agitation it seemed to me that the October Group wished to carry out extensive work among the workers, and it succeeded overwhelmingly. This work, however, was unfortunately only carried out on the basis of revolutionary instinct; its leading cadre, moreover, severely affected by imperialist repression as well as by the treachery or defection of a certain leading member [2] was unable to regain its sense of direction. It then abandoned this work to resort to an adventurist policy of dual power with the Stalinists.
As for the La Lutte group, its leadership was re-established and the same personnel were once again reunited. [3]
In the midst and at the height of the struggle one fact has tormented me for a good number of years: our leader Ta Thu Thau left us in order to return to the north of Vietnam. The entire defeat was partly the result of his departure from the field of battle. Officially, as far as we rank and file militants were concerned, Ta Thu Thau had left on a mission to the north. However, according to his second in command, he intended to get to Chungking (via Yunnan). [4]
In accordance with the unanimous political orientation at that time, “march separately, strike together”, the remaining Central Committee carried on its work of agitation and propaganda, whilst placing itself under the control of the Vietminh front when it came to action. In addition, the Central Committee obtained permission from the Stalinists to set up a workers’ militia of self-defence (with the proviso that the military command was put under government control). The government, moreover, already under the direction of the Vietminh Front, took charge of material aid, arms and ammunition. Nothing could get through without the permission of the Stalinists. So carried away by their enthusiasm, and by the favourable political situation at the time, our comrades had forgotten all distrust of the Stalinists. From then on our comrades slowed down the work of setting up soviets in the city, of turning the factories into fortresses, and of preparing for a civil war. The militants of the October Group only weakly criticised the La Lutte group. The final days of the existence of the Vietminh Front in Saigon were painful. Everybody, on our side as well as the entire population, felt that something dire was threatening us and lying in wait for us. It was too late for we Trotskyists to do anything in the city of Saigon, no matter what.
23 September 1945. A violent seizure of power by French imperialism, assisted actively by the British army and passively by the Japanese military police. The Vietnamese government immediately gave the order to evacuate Saigon and await further instructions: “Let us keep calm”.
The Central Committee of La Lutte was completely dispersed for several days. Then, in the middle of the night, I was awoken by a comrade who passed on to me instructions appointing me as an aide to a member of the Central Committee [5], along with an order to meet him 150 kilometres south-west of Saigon and conduct him safe and sound to our headquarters, situated 20 kilometres to the north of Saigon. What joy! I can still remember how, half an hour after this news, having kissed my mother goodbye and leaving her in the care of my sister, I left on my bike at one in the morning and pedalled without stopping to carry out my mission. Three days later we were at headquarters.
The ‘General Staff’ of the La Lutte group existed for about 12 days. It must be realised that we were far from really being that. All this existed in name only. The abrupt dispersal of our comrades led us, in fact, to total disaster: we only had 30 soldiers to the right and left of us, along with different organisations in a state of dissolution. As far as the city workers were concerned, they had either obeyed the evacuation order or were following the regular regiments of the government.
Among the Central Committee members present at headquarters were:

1. Tran Van Thach, a lawyer and former editor of the paper La Lutte.
2. Phan Van Hum, author and philosopher.
3. Phan Van Chanh, a university lecturer.
4. Ung Hoa, the group’s General Secretary.
5. Nguyen Thi Loi, a schoolteacher.
6. Nguyen Van So. [6]
7. Le Van Thu, a journalist.

These were seven out of the 11 members of the Central Committee of La Lutte. We were very well placed from the point of view of military strategy. We enjoyed sympathy and deep respect as regards the civilian population. They looked upon us as serious people and as revolutionaries who were willing to sacrifice themselves to build something better. [7]
In the remaining paragraphs I shall go over the entire meticulous preparations of the Stalinists for the extermination of the Trotskyists. As I see it, it was a conscious undertaking on the part of the Stalinists. For two weeks before the date of 23 September everywhere in every village on the official notice boards could be found articles drawing the attention of the public to the secret preparations of a “certain organisation” to sabotage the peace and the independence of the country. This was a blow aimed at the Trotskyists. So our comrades could easily determine the atmosphere among the public that surrounded us at that time.
I have forgotten to tell you until now that Saigon under the Vietminh government had four military districts: the first was controlled by the Stalinists and the other three by nationalist forces and by forces close to the Trotskyists.
Here is a diagram that will enable you to follow the tactics of the Stalinists in action. Zone 1 was under Stalinist control and was mainly peasant. Zone 2 was half peasant and half working class, and was under the control of the second and third divisions of the Vietnamese army. The majority of the staff in command of the second zone were Trotskyists (former members of the La Lutte group). In addition, a number of principled agreements had been reached between Vu Tranh Anh, the commander of the second division, a former officer in the Japanese army, and the leaders of the La Lutte group.
One further point: the headquarters of the La Lutte group had been set up on the border of the non-Stalinist and Stalinist zones. Zones 3 and 4 had no military divisions, but the apparatus of the GPU was in Zone 3. The administrator of Zone 4 was a neutral intellectual. Every approach to and negotiation with the Vietminh took place through his mediation.
My stay at headquarters was for me an unforgettable and historic memory. United in a common cause, we, who previously had belonged to different social layers, helped each other hand by hand through the fire of our enemies. Day and night, in sun and rain, through vicious jungles and vast rubber plantations, we soldiers of the proletarian general staff tirelessly carried out military manoeuvres by the techniques of guerilla warfare. We were under the command of a former NCO in the French army. We had hardly anything in the way of weapons. Some reliable comrades were assigned the tasks of buying or acquiring arms by our own means on the one hand, or on the other of negotiating with the Vietminh government.
While I am on this subject, as a soldier I did not know anything of the various negotiations between our General Staff and the Vietminh leaders. Nevertheless, on several occasions our comrade Phan Van Chanh was summoned by the Stalinist representatives. And on one occasion, four days before the arrest of our comrades, a Stalinist military and political commission came right into our headquarters, whether to negotiate or to look us over, I don’t know which. As for the surrounding civilian population, they were very impressed by our ideals and actions. Every day they brought us firewood, rice and various foodstuffs free of charge.
Three days before our headquarters was disbanded, we received a number of items of disturbing news:
1. A French cruiser, the Richelieu, had disembarked Leclerc’s troops onto our territory.
2. The second division of the Vietnamese army, on which we had placed all our hopes, had suffered reverses and had had to withdraw. At the front the Allied airborne troops and those of Leclerc (the armoured division in particular) were on the rampage; in the rear, in Zones 3 and 4, the soldiers of the second division had been discharged by the Stalinist forces, who had incited the entire population against this division – a division commanded by a traitor.
3. Our comrade Phan Van Chanh, ask to go with the Vietnamese police, gave himself up and was arrested on the spot. We have had no news of him since then. As far as he is concerned, even his wife who was arrested at the same time and was afterwards released, has not been able find out whether her husband is still alive.
From then onwards we witnessed the complete dispersal and disappearance of our comrades. Our General Staff sent Nguyen Thi Loi on a mission in Zone 1 and then he disappeared.
Our General Staff (I do not know whether it was an order on behalf of the Vietminh government or by its own decision) informed and advised us to get ready to leave for the front in the course of the week. Each of us had to leave our dirty linen in the care of a reliable comrade and we were able to obtain 24 hour leave. As I was still a soldier, I was much intrigued by all of this; it meant leaving the front under arms.
One day before the entire headquarters was arrested, more and more alarming decisions permitted us to foresee certain disaster. And on the basis of all this, I insist that our leaders knew and were aware of the crime that the Stalinists had in store for them.
Comrade Phan Van Hum left the headquarters to go 20 kilometres to the north east to prepare a camp, so that oor soldiers could find refuge there after the ‘final battle’. He left, and then disappeared.
On the final night comrade Tran Van Thach was the only Central Committee member to remain at the headquarters. We soldiers received the order to form a double guard and search everybody who passed in front of our headquarters.
At 5.30a.m. 10 gardes mobiles arrived, under the command of the Stalinist police commissioner of the district, to take away comrade Train Van Thach, to search the entire building and to collect everything together.
Then, for the first time in my life, I heard at first hand the slanders and actions of the Stalinists (both at the same time). Brandishing his revolver, the commissioner gave we soldiers a long lecture.
As for comrade Nguyen Van So, he too was arrested a few days later in equally stormy circumstances (according to accounts on the spot). Then he disappeared.
Of the seven comrades present at the headquarters, five have been murdered, and only two were able to escape.
One of them, Ung Hoa, has, I think, allied with Bao Dai during recent times, since he is related to the royal family.
As for the last of them, Le Van Thu, he still remains in Saigon, sending money to La Verité from time to time.

Encyclopedia of Trotskyism On-Line: Revolutionary History

Forget! Do not forget! Only conscience knows it And future deeds will respond to it!

‘Comrade P’

Notes

The notes are those of the author unless otherwise stated.
1. It should be noted that the circulation did not exceed 15,000. Nonetheless, this was a considerable figure for a non-industrial city of 250,000 inhabitants.
2. Ho Huu Tuong (1910-1980) was arrested at the beginning of the war in 1939 and condemned to four years in prison on 16 April 1940. In 1944 he declared that he had abandoned Marxism and went over to Buddhism, and he later became a professor at the Buddhist University in Saigon. He was released, but placed under house arrest. According to his autobiography, 41 nam Lam Bao (41 Years in Journalism), p.130, the emancipation of humanity by the proletariat is the greatest myth of the nineteenth century, and the revolutionary potential of the proletariat in Europe and North America the greatest myth of the twentieth.
He became a nationalist, and as advisor to Bay Vien, the chief of the Binh Xuyen pirates in rebellion against the Diem government, was arrested and on 28 September 1957 was condemned to death and sent to Poulo Condore concentration camp. When Diem fell from power he was released, and in 1970 campaigned for non-alignment and a ‘third force’, for which he was then deported again by the Thieu government. After the southern regime fell he was arrested by the Stalinists and then interned in a. ‘re-education camp’, and died on the day of his release, 26 June 1980. [Information given to us by Comrade Ngo Van Xuyet]
3. If the La Lutte group allowed some important political issues to bypass it, that was the result of the weakness of our movement on the international level at that time, of the lack of contact between the various sections and particularly of contact with the International Secretariat. Our comrades were unable to keep up with international movements during their five years of deportation.
4. Two years afterwards, once I was able to survey the events as a whole, I came to the conclusion that at that time Ta Thu Thau was all too aware that the Central Committee of the Communist Party in the north and that in the south were not acting in concert with each other. The operations conducted by Tran ’don Giau in Cochin China from the start were not dictated by Ho Chi Minh. It was through wanting to meet Ho Chi Minh, in other words the entire action committee, that Ta Thu Thau exposed himself to risk in this way.
5. He was engaged in carrying on a campaign for the formation of a trade union among schoolteachers.
6. I do not know exactly what his profession was. He was a former student at the ecole normale superieur. He did not live at the headquarters, but about 10 kilometres from there.
7. That was a mistake on the part of our leadership. The population accused us of nothing. It could, however, clearly see the formation of a state within a state. On 22 September 1945, one day before the decision to evacuate the city, on the orders of the Stalinist leader Tran Van Giau, the government decreed the disarming of all military divisions, and the issue of a warrant in particular for the arrest of Vu Tran Anh on a charge of embezzling funds. Now it seems to me that he insinuated himself into the ranks of the Japanese army in order to get out of the country, since he had relinquished his command to his aide-de-camp.

***In The Time Of The Hard Motorcycle Boys- “The Wild One”

 

 

 

DVD Review

The Wild One, Marlon Brando, Lee Marvin, produced by Stanley Kramer, 1954

 

Okay here is the book of genesis, the motorcycle book of genesis, or at least my motorcycle book of genesis. But, before I get to that let me make about seventy–six disclaimers. First, the whys and wherefores of the motorcycle culture, except on those occasions when they become subject to governmental investigation or impact some cultural phenomena, is outside the purview of the leftist politics that dominate the commentary in this space. There is no Marxoid political line, as a rule, on such activity, nor should there be. Those exceptions include when motorcyclists, usually under the rubric of “bad actor” motorcycle clubs, like the famous (or infamous) Oakland, California-based Hell’s Angels are generally harassed by the cops and we have to defend their right to be left alone (you know, those "helmet laws", and the never-failing pull-over for "driving while biker") or, like when the Angels were used by the Rolling Stones at Altamont and that ill-advised decision represented a watershed in the 1960s counter-cultural movement. Or, more ominously, from another angle when such lumpen formations form the core hell-raisers of anti-immigrant, anti-socialist,   anti-gay, anti-women, anti-black liberation fascistic demonstrations and we are compelled, and rightly so, to go toe to toe with them. Scary yes, necessary yes, bikes or no bikes.

Second, in the interest of full disclosure I own no stock, or have any other interest, in Harley-Davidson, or any other motorcycle company. Third, I do not now, or have I ever belonged to a motorcycle club or owned a motorcycle, although I have driven them, or, more often, on back of them on occasion. Fourth, I do not now, knowingly or unknowingly, although I grew up in working- class neighborhoods where bikes and bikers were plentiful, hang with such types. Fifth, the damn things and their riders are too noisy, despite the glamour and “freedom” of the road associated with them. Sixth, and here is the “kicker”, I have been, endlessly, fascinated by bikes and bike culture as least since early high school, if not before, and had several friends who “rode.” Well that is not seventy-six but that is enough for disclaimers.

Okay, as to genesis, motorcycle genesis. Let’s connect the dots. A couple of years ago, and maybe more, as part of a trip down memory lane, the details of which do not need detain us here, I did a series of articles on various world-shaking, earth-shattering subjects like high school romances, high school hi-jinks, high school dances, high school Saturday nights, and most importantly of all, high school how to impress the girls( or boys, for girls, or whatever sexual combinations fit these days, but you can speak for yourselves, I am standing on this ground). In short, high school sub-culture, American-style, early 1960s branch, although the emphasis there, as it will be here, is on that social phenomena as filtered through the lenses of a working- class town, a seen better days town at that, my growing up wild-like-the-weeds town.

One of the subjects worked over in that series was the search, the eternal search I might add, for the great working- class love song. Not the Teen Angel, Earth Angel, Johnny Angel generic mush that could play in Levittown, Shaker Heights or La Jolla as well as Youngstown or Moline. No, a song that, without blushing, one could call our own, our working- class own, one that the middle and upper classes might like but would not put on their dance cards. As my offering to this high-brow debate I offered a song by written by Englishman Richard Thompson (who folkies, and folk rockers, might know from his Fairport Convention days, very good days, by the way), Vincent Black Lightning, 1952. (See lyrics below.) Without belaboring the point the gist of this song is the biker romance, British version, between outlaw biker James and black-leathered, red-headed Molly. Needless to say such a tenuous lumpen existence as James leads to keep himself “biked" cuts short any long term “little white house with picket fence” ending for the pair. And we do not need such a boring finish. For James, after losing the inevitable running battle with the police, on his death bed bequeaths his bike, his precious “Vincent Black Lightning”, to said Molly. His bike, man! His bike! Is there any greater love story, working class love story, around? No, this makes West Side Story lyrics and a whole bunch of other such songs seem like so much cornball nonsense. His bike, man. Wow! Kudos, Brother Richard Thompson (the first name needed as another Thompson, Hunter, Doctor Gonzo, of journalistic legend, cut his teeth on the Hell’s Angels)    

Needless to say that exploration was not the end, but rather the beginning of thinking through the great American night bike experience. And, of course, for this writer that means going to the books, the films and the memory bank to find every seemingly relevant “biker” experience. Such classic motorcycle sagas as “gonzo” journalist, Doctor Hunter S. Thompson’s Hell’s Angels and other, later Rolling Stone magazine printed “biker” stories and Tom Wolfe’ Hell Angel’s-sketched Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (and other articles about California subset youth culture that drove Wolfe’s work in the old days). And to the hellish Rolling Stones (band) Hell’s Angels “policed” Altamont concert in 1969. And, as fate would have it, with the passing of actor/director Dennis Hooper, the 1960s classic biker/freedom/ seeking the great American night film, Easy Rider. And from Easy Rider to the “max daddy” of them all, tight-jeaned, thick leather-belted, tee-shirted, engineer-booted, leather-jacketed, taxi-driver-capped (hey, that’s what it reminds me of), side-burned, chain-linked wielding, hard-living, alienated, but in the end really just misunderstood, Johnny, aka, Marlon Brando, in The Wild One.

Okay, we will cut to the chase on the plot. Old Johnny and his fellow “outlaw” motorcycle club members are out for some weekend “kicks” after a hard week’s non-work (as far as we can figure out, work was marginal for many reasons, as Hunter Thompson in Hell’s Angels noted, to biker existence, the pursue of jack-rolling, armed robbery or grand theft auto careers probably running a little ahead) out in the sunny California small town hinterlands.(They are still heading out there today, the last time I noticed, in the Southern California high desert, places like Twenty-Nine Palms and Joshua Tree.)

And naturally, when the boys (and they are all boys here, except for a couple of “mamas”, one spurned by Johnny, in a break-away club led by jack-in-the-box jokester, Lee Marvin as Chino) hit one small town they, naturally, after sizing up the local law, head for the local café (and bar). And once one mentions cafes in small towns in California (or Larry McMurtry’s West Texas, for that matter), then hard-working, trying to make it through the shift, got to get out of this small town and see the world, dreamy-eyed, naïve (yes, naive) sheriff-daughtered young waitress, Kathy, (yes, and hard-working, it’s tough dealing them off the arm in these kind of joints, or elsewhere) Johnny trap comes into play. Okay, now you know, even alienated, misunderstood, misanthropic, cop-hating (an additional obstacle given said waitress’s kinships) boy Johnny needs, needs cinematically at least, to meet a girl who understands him.

The development of that young hope, although hopeless, boy meets girl romance relationship, hither and yon, drives the plot. Oh, and along the way the boys, after a few thousand beers, as boys, especially girl-starved biker boys, will, at the drop of a hat start to systematically tear down the town, off-handedly, for fun. Needless to say, staid local burghers (aka “squares”) seeing what amount to them is their worst 1950s “communist” invasion nightmare, complete with murder, mayhem and rapine, (although that “c” word was not used in the film, nor should it have been) are determined to “take back” their little town. A few fights, forages, causalities, fatalities, and forgivenesses later though, still smitten but unquenched and chaste Johnny (and his rowdy crowd) and said waitress part, wistfully. The lesson here, for the kids in the theater audience, is that biker love outside biker-dom is doomed. For the adults, the real audience, the lesson: nip the “terrorists” in the bud (call in the state cops, the national guard, the militia, the 82nd Airborne, The Strategic Air Command, NATO, hell, even the “weren't we buddies in the war” Red Army , but nip it, fast when they come roaming through Amityville, Archer City, or your small town).

After that summary you can see what we are up against. This is pure fantasy Hollywood cautionary tale on a very real 1950s phenomena, “outlaw” biker clubs, mainly in California, but elsewhere as well. Hunter Thompson did yeoman’s work in his Hell’s Angels to “discover” who these guys were and what drove them, beyond drugs, sex, rock and roll (and, yah, murder and mayhem, the California prison system was a “home away from home”). In a sense the “bikers” were the obverse of the boys (again, mainly) whom Tom Wolfe, in many of his early essays, was writing about and who were (a) forming the core of the surfers on the beaches from Malibu to La Jolla and, (b) driving the custom car/hot rod/drive-in centered (later mall-centered) cool, teenage girl–impressing, car craze night in the immediate post-World War II great American Western sunny skies and pleasant dream drift (physically and culturally). Except those Wolfe guys were the “winners”. The “bikers” were Nelson Algren’s “losers”, the dead-enders who didn’t hit the gold rush, the Dove Linkhorns (aka the Arkies and Okies who in the 1930s populated John Steinbeck’s Joad saga, The Grapes Of Wrath). Not cool, iconic Marlin-Johnny but hell-bend then-Hell Angels leader, Sonny Barger.

And that is why in the end, as beautifully sullen and misunderstood the alienated Johnny was, and as wholesomely rowdy as his gang was before demon rum took over, this was not the real “biker: scene, West or East.

Now I lived, as a teenager, in a working- class, really marginally working- poor, neighborhood that I have previously mentioned was the leavings of those who were moving up in post-war society. That neighborhood was no more than a mile from the central headquarters of Boston's local Hell’s Angels (although they were not called that, I think it was Deathheads, or something like that). I got to see these guys up close as they rallied at various spots on our local beach or “ran” through our neighborhood on their way to some crazed action. The leader had all of the charisma of Marlon Brando’s thick leather belt. His face, as did most of the faces, spoke of small-minded cruelties (and old prison pallors) not of misunderstood youth. And their collective prison records (as Hunter Thompson also noted about the Angels) spoke of “high” lumpenism. And that takes us back to the beginning about who, and what, forms one of the core cohorts for a fascist movement in this country, the sons of Sonny Barger. Then we will need to rely on our socialist politics, and other such weapons.

*************

ARTIST: Richard Thompson

TITLE: 1952 Vincent Black Lightning

Lyrics and Chords

 

Said Red Molly to James that's a fine motorbike

A girl could feel special on any such like

Said James to Red Molly, well my hat's off to you

It's a Vincent Black Lightning, 1952

And I've seen you at the corners and cafes it seems

Red hair and black leather, my favorite color scheme

And he pulled her on behind

And down to Box Hill they did ride

 

/ A - - - D - / - - - - A - / : / E - D A /

/ E - D A - / Bm - D - / - - - - A - - - /

 

Said James to Red Molly, here's a ring for your right hand

But I'll tell you in earnest I'm a dangerous man

I've fought with the law since I was seventeen

I robbed many a man to get my Vincent machine

Now I'm 21 years, I might make 22

And I don't mind dying, but for the love of you

And if fate should break my stride

Then I'll give you my Vincent to ride

 

Come down, come down, Red Molly, called Sergeant McRae

For they've taken young James Adie for armed robbery

Shotgun blast hit his chest, left nothing inside

Oh, come down, Red Molly to his dying bedside

When she came to the hospital, there wasn't much left

He was running out of road, he was running out of breath

But he smiled to see her cry

And said I'll give you my Vincent to ride

 

Says James, in my opinion, there's nothing in this world

Beats a 52 Vincent and a red headed girl

Now Nortons and Indians and Greeveses won't do

They don't have a soul like a Vincent 52

He reached for her hand and he slipped her the keys

He said I've got no further use for these

I see angels on Ariels in leather and chrome

Swooping down from heaven to carry me home

And he gave her one last kiss and died

And he gave her his Vincent to ride

On Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Memorial To Colonel Robert Gould Shaw And The Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment (Volunteers)-Take One 

 

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

…he had walked pass that blessed muddied- unattended frieze across from the State House on Beacon Street in Boston it seemed half his life. Anytime he cadged a hooky day from high school back in the early 1960s in order to head into downtown Boston and check out the day life on the Common, grab an off-beat movie at the many big house theaters on lower Washington Street, or just hang out he would circle around Beacon Street after emerging from the Park Street subway station. Walked head down right by the marble. Later, mid-1960s later, when he went to school in that same downtown Boston and had to work trucks to make his daily meat he would pass the memorial on his way to school. Still later when he lived on the hill (Beacon Hill) in splendor or rut the same thing.

Passed it like it was just another in a long line of historic ornaments in a town filled with memorials to its ancient arrival long continental history. Bloody battle number one here, bloody battle number two there, statute of some fire-breathing Puritan divine here or some furious bearded abolitionist there, some-battle-hardened general there, some corruption-filled over-fed civic leader here. The town was a tribute to all that went down in the cold American East when west, real west, was someplace around the Hudson River and dreams were of making it along the Eastern seaboard and not having to trek inland to face the unknown, natural or man-make.   

Had too passed blinkered that monument to some pretty important history going on right before his eyes down in bloody Birmingham/Selma/Greensboro/Philadelphia (MS that is)/Montgomery/Oxford (MS again) and one thousand other later to be   storied locales after the dust cleared (and the fight reined in). Yet with all that civil rights let-them-vote-sent-books-to Alabama-ride-the-freedom-bus was clueless to that aspect of his history, those places Fort Wagner above all, where his people, his black proud Massachusetts 54^th (and later 55^th) had made righteous stand for freedom, had filled the ranks, had arms in hand confirmed the worst planter’s nightmare, had bled rivers of blood, and had not waited on some benevolent white man to do the work of freedom…

View this message in your browser. The Guantanamo prisoners' hunger strike began more than one year ago, grew very large, waned, and continues, although the military won't report how many prisoners are refusing food, and how many they are force-feeding. Sometimes, we think we know all there is to be known on this story, and sometimes, we admit to knowing very little. Here is the work of three writers: Andy Worthington writes about Emad Hassan, one of the Yemeni prisoners who has been "cleared" to leave for years: In 2005, when the doctors were still human beings, the hunger strikers didn’t worry about their health because there was level of trust with the medical team. One of the doctors refused to go along with force feeding, because he believed that his medical ethics were more important than the order of a military colonel. But then things changed. The military only recruited doctors who agreed, before they arrived here, that a military order was more important than morality. The new wave of doctors allowed the military officers to instruct them on how to conduct the medical procedure of force feeding. Hassan wrote a letter to the Middle East Monitor last month.  He explains that in 2005, there was a level of trust the prisoners had for the medical personnel.  One of the doctors then refused to go along with force-feeding prisoners because "he believed that his medical ethics were more important than the order of a military colonel."  But he explains that now, all that has changed, because medical personnel are hand-picked to go along with orders. Hassan describes the "truly ugly faces of the doctors, nurses, and other medical staffers" in recent days as they subjected him to a "novel regime" of force-feeding. Read more... We who already know have to keep learning more, and spreading the knowledge with a call to Close Guantanamo NOW.  Last month Andy and Dennis Loo spoke at the Cal Poly Pomona campus to several hundred students about Guantanamo.  Many wrote papers whicih show the degree to which people can change their thoughts very quickly when challenged. Guantanamo: What I Knew was Scant and False By Leslie Becerra (2/18/14) (This is one of many student papers written in response to the Close Guantanamo Now! National Tour’s Last Stop at Cal Poly Pomona on January 17, 2014. Reprinted by author’s permission.) When 9/11 happened I was only eight years old and unable to understand what exactly it meant. I don’t remember much about where I was when I saw the news or whom I was with but I do remember when the war began. There is an image that has always stuck with me about the war. I was watching the news in my mother’s room one night when the broadcast was suddenly interrupted by the news and behind the anchor in a big screen played live images of the first bomb being dropped in Iraq. It’s been that image that I think of when anyone mentions 9/11, until recently. As my education has progressed I have learned more and more about what 9/11 did for this country. Those events brought our entire nation together in solidarity for those who lost their lives and their families but it also did something horrible. The events of 9/11 made our nation hate and fear an entire group of people for no real reason. Due to the government and the media’s manipulation of events we all began to think of American lives as more valuable than the lives of these people. It is that very belief that allowed our government to commit atrocities against other humans without anyone putting into question their motives. The talk given at Cal Poly Pomona in regards to the closure of Guantanamo Bay made three very important points. One, Obama has been lying to the nation from the moment he took office by blaming Congress for the continued use of Guantanamo. Two, the responsibility to make sure Guantanamo Bay is closed does not only rely on Obama and our government but it also relies on us as a people. Finally, the talk made me realize that the information that was given to me about such facility was very scarce and the very little that I had was false. I want to speak on the first point made by the talk, Obama and his real intentions. From the beginning of his campaign Obama sold himself as a president of the people and for the people. He stated that if made president he would seek to close Guantanamo Bay and free those detained there but a year into his second term Guantanamo Bay remains open. Why? Well, according to the President of the United States, we are to blame Congress. Despite the many requests for the complete closure of Guantanamo Bay Congress has decided to keep it open. Although Congress may have an interest in keeping Guantanamo Bay open we can easily place the blame on Obama. Again, why? As commander in chief Obama, our president, has the power to order the closure of Guantanamo Bay with or without the approval of Congress. So the real reason behind Guantanamo Bay keeping its doors open over 10 years later is because Obama does not want to shut it down. He has the power to free the detainees yet has chosen not to use it and instead closed down the office responsible for transmitting the releases. This is one of the most important points made during the talk, if not the most important, because it is an example of how our government no longer has the people’s interest in mind but rather its own personal gain. We live in a country whose people are taught that the government governs with our best interest at hand but how often is that true? In whose interests is it to maintain Guantanamo Bay open? Because it is not in any human’s interests to allow any government to do what our government has been doing to these people. We are all human beings therefore our lives are all equally valuable. If we continue to allow our government to act as they please and ignore our requests we will have no guarantee that they won’t do the same to us. Obama’s failure to close Guantanamo Bay shows how the people who run our government are no longer the common day civilian but rather those few with power and money. Capitalism has allowed for money and corporations to have a say in what our government does thus the people’s best interest gets ignored. It is because of such reason that we must take responsibility to get Guantanamo Bay closed. Lastly, this development, a letter from Chicago attorneys to Obama: In Open Letter, Major Obama Supporters Call for Action to Close Guantánamo as Promised Share this message: Next World Can't Tonight! 10pm Eastern / 7pm Pacific A one hour conference call involving activists & thinkers from around the country on issues & actions World Can't Wait is addressing & planning Register for dial-in info Topics: March anniversary of Iraq war; April & May Spring Actions to Stop US Drone War Debra Sweet, Director, The World Can't Wait If you were forwarded this message and would like to subscribe directly, sign up here. World Can't Wait | (866) 973-4463 | 305 West Broadway #185 NY, NY 10013 Make a donation online | Make a tax-deductible donation online Send checks or money orders, payable to "World Can't Wait": World Can't Wait 305 W. Broadway #185 New York, NY 10013 To make a tax-deductible donation of $100 or more in support of World Can't Wait's educational activities, please make checks out to "World Can't Wait/Alliance for Global Justice," a 501(3)(c) organization. You are receiving this email because alfredjohnson34@comcast.net is subscribed to this email announcement list.

‘Wounds of Waziristan’: The Story of Drones

As Told By the People Who Live Under Them

Hear from the Director:  Madiha Tahir,

a Pakistani-American journalist who filmed interviews with the people who live in the Tribal Areas of Pakistan under the constant presence of the U.S.-launched drones, and in the wake of their destruction.

SATURDAY, MARCH 8, 2:00 PM

MIT – 4-231

 

77 Mass. Ave., Cambridge

 

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Drone victims – Are they terrorists?

Sponsors:

Eastern Mass. Anti-Drone Network Task Force of United for Justice with Peace, Alliance for a Secular and Democratic South Asia,

Mass. Global Action, MIT Western Hemisphere Project

justicewithpeace.org, (617) 776-6524

The Class Struggle Continues ...

Imagine the shoe on the other foot

by Daniel Patrick Welch

My mind is about to explode. The news is so surreal I can only cope by resorting to satire. Imagine the shoe on the other foot... [blurred dream transition scene]:

BREAKING: Putin, Xi, Maduro and Castro arrive in Quebec to negotiate a transitional government and protect the breakaway province from reprisal by "English-speaking cultural hegemony." Putin accuses Obama of 'interfering' as riots grip Toronto and Montreal, aided by covert Russian and Chinese training and funding. Lavrov is caught on tape vowing to "Fuck those Limey bastards." Saintly Obama does nothing, saying 'it's none of our damn business. We're all about freedom, above the border as well as below."

The situation is quickly spinning out of control as what Putin describes as 'peaceful protesters' arm themselves with Molotov cocktails, sniper rifles, and arms looted from police barracks. As many as 87 law enforcement have been killed, some beaten to death in broad daylight by angry mobs. The Canadian President's attempt to restore order was met with swift and harsh condemnation by China, Russia and members of the Shanghai Cooperation Council, which imposed immediate sanctions on Canada as well as travel restrictions on key members of the freely elected government. Putin, asked about the obvious contradiction between his comments praising the gangs' taking law into their own hands and professions to 'democracy' and 'free speech,' was unmoved. In response to repeated questions on how he could maintain such a position when his own ministers had been recorded planning the coup, he lashed out at reporters, Obama, and the weather. "Fuck you. We're the biggest dog on the block, and we don't have to give a shit what anyone thinks. We've toppled governments in like 50-60 countries in the last 50 years--you think some whiny bullshit is going to stop us? Don't get it twisted--we do whatever we want, and make up the lies to justify it as we go along. Then we plant stories in a corrupt and compliant press so your idiot citizens will play along. Besides... Democracy! Freedom! &#65533;&#65533;&#65533;&#65533;&#65533; Etc."

While the entire world community, with the exception of Albania and Andorra are aghast at Putin's outburst, Obama remained strangely sanguine. "Makes sense to me. These are clearly just innocent victims of an evil elected government out to get them. I don't see any reason why I should be alarmed at armed gangs shooting cops and burning down state property--even when they are funded by our enemies in a country sharing the longest international border in the world. We'll just wait and see what happens. But what the hell do I know? I'm a complete fucking sock puppet--the biggest stooge of a president since Truman, and twice as dangerous. Either that or I'm evil incarnate. I haven't quite made up my mind yet."

Just kidding. Obama actually gave the immediate order to invade Canada, essentially flattening Montreal, Toronto, Quebec, and for some reason, Calgary, saying he was "hoping to catch those red bastards with their pants down." DEFCON 5 put Beijing, Moscow, Havana and Caracas in the nuclear crosshairs as subs were positioned for a first strike against all cities. "We can't allow this kind of meddling on our borders," the president erupted at an unusually tense press conference. "I mean, can you imagine if we went and started wars in, say, Georgia and Ukraine? The Russians would go nuts, and my balls would be on the block before you could say boo. And they'd be completely within their rights."

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The Anti-Empire Report #125

“Bias in favor of the orthodox is frequently mistaken for ‘objectivity’. Departures from this ideological orthodoxy are themselves dismissed as ideological.” – Michael Parenti

An exchange in January with Paul Farhi, Washington Post columnist, about coverage of US foreign policy:

Dear Mr. Farhi,
Now that you’ve done a study of al-Jazeera’s political bias in supporting Mohamed Morsi in Egypt, is it perhaps now time for a study of the US mass media’s bias on US foreign policy? And if you doubt the extent and depth of this bias, consider this:
There are more than 1,400 daily newspapers in the United States. Can you name a single paper, or a single TV network, that was unequivocally opposed to the American wars carried out against Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yugoslavia, Panama, Grenada, and Vietnam? Or even opposed to any two of these wars? How about one? In 1968, six years into the Vietnam war, the Boston Globe surveyed the editorial positions of 39 leading US papers concerning the war and found that “none advocated a pull-out”.
Now, can you name an American daily newspaper or TV network that more or less gives any support to any US government ODE (Officially Designated Enemy)? Like Hugo Chávez of Venezuela or his successor, Nicolás Maduro; Fidel or Raúl Castro of Cuba; Bashar al-Assad of Syria; Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran; Rafael Correa of Ecuador; or Evo Morales of Bolivia? I mean that presents the ODE’s point of view in a reasonably fair manner most of the time? Or any ODE of the recent past like Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia, Moammar Gaddafi of Libya, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, or Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti?
Who in the mainstream media supports Hamas of Gaza? Or Hezbollah of Lebanon? Who in the mainstream media is outspokenly critical of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians? And keeps his or her job?
Who in the mainstream media treats Julian Assange or Chelsea Manning as the heroes they are?
And this same mainstream media tell us that Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador, et al. do not have a real opposition media.
The ideology of the American mainstream media is the belief that they don’t have any ideology; that they are instead what they call “objective”. I submit that there is something more important in journalism than objectivity. It is capturing the essence, or the truth, if you will, with the proper context and history. This can, as well, serve as “enlightenment”.
It’s been said that the political spectrum concerning US foreign policy in the America mainstream media “runs the gamut from A to B”.
Sincerely, William Blum, Washington, DC

(followed by some of my writing credentials)

–

Reply from Paul Farhi:

I think you’re conflating news coverage with editorial policy. They are not the same. What a newspaper advocates on its editorial page (the Vietnam example you cite) isn’t the same as what or how the story is covered in the news columns. News MAY have some advocacy in it, but it’s not supposed to, and not nearly as overt or blatant as an editorial or opinion column. Go back over all of your ODE examples and ask yourself if the news coverage was the same as the opinions about those ODEs. In most cases. I doubt it was.

–

Dear Mr. Farhi,
Thank you for your remarkably prompt answer.
Your point about the difference between news coverage and editorial policy is important, but the fact is, as a daily, and careful, reader of the Post for the past 20 years I can attest to the extensive bias in its foreign policy coverage in the areas I listed. Juan Ferrero in Latin America and Kathy Lally in the Mideast are but two prime examples. The bias, most commonly, is one of omission more than commission; which is to say it’s what they leave out that distorts the news more than any factual errors or out-and-out lies. My Anti-Empire Report contains many examples of these omissions, as well as some errors of commission.
Incidentally, since 1995 I have written dozens of letters to the Post pointing out errors in foreign-policy coverage. Not one has been printed.
Happy New Year

–

I present here an extreme example of bias by omission, in the entire American mainstream media: In my last report I wrote of the committee appointed by the president to study NSA abuses – Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies – which actually came up with a few unexpected recommendations in its report presented December 13, the most interesting of which perhaps are these two:

“Governments should not use surveillance to steal industry secrets to advantage their domestic industry.”

“Governments should not use their offensive cyber capabilities to change the amounts held in financial accounts or otherwise manipulate the financial systems.”

So what do we have here? The NSA being used to steal industrial secrets; nothing to do with fighting terrorism. And the NSA stealing money and otherwise sabotaging unnamed financial systems, which may also represent gaining industrial advantage for the United States.

Long-time readers of this report may have come to the realization that I’m not an ecstatic admirer of US foreign policy. But this stuff shocks even me. It’s the gross pettiness of “The World’s Only Superpower”.

A careful search of the extensive Lexis-Nexis database failed to turn up a single American mainstream media source, print or broadcast, that mentioned this revelation. I found it only on those websites which carried my report, plus three other sites: Techdirt, Lawfare, and Crikey (First Digital Media).

For another very interesting and extreme example of bias by omission, as well as commission, very typical of US foreign policy coverage in the mainstream media: First read the January 31, page one, Washington Post article making fun of socialism in Venezuela and Cuba.

Then read the response from two Americans who have spent a lot of time in Venezuela, are fluent in Spanish, and whose opinions about the article I solicited.

I lived in Chile during the 1972-73 period under Salvadore Allende and his Socialist Party. The conservative Chilean media’s sarcastic claims at the time about shortages and socialist incompetence were identical to what we’ve been seeing for years in the United States concerning Venezuela and Cuba. The Washington Post article on Venezuela referred to above could have been lifted out of Chile’s El Mercurio, 1973.

[Note to readers: Please do not send me the usual complaints about my using the name “America(n)” to refer to “The United States”. I find it to be a meaningless issue, if not plain silly.]

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The US will not permit democracy without a fight a fight from us; as true at home as it is worldwide] moneyout-votersin.org/ Be Part of the McCutcheon Rapid Response The U.S. Supreme Court could issue its ruling in the case some are calling the next Citizens United any day. On October 8, 2013 the Court heard arguments for McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. Never before has our political campaign system been as corrupted as now with unlimited corporate spending and dark money. Our democracy is eroding before us. But all over the country people are also fighting back and demanding change. 16 states called for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United and related cases and the movement is growing. Now is the time to take our fight to the next level and mobilize across the country on the day of the McCutcheon ruling. Sign up for an event today!

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[thanks Gina!   love it :-) ordering mine right now

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Thinking for Ourselves About Venezuela

"The U.S. thinks it has found a formula for regime change, beginning with destabilization from within. Venezuela’s democratically elected government has long been a target. “Over the last decade or so we have seen this strategy attempted in Zimbabwe, Libya, Iran, and Syria.”

“The Obama Administration and capitalist news media want everyone to believe a repressive Venezuelan government is attacking peaceful protests.”

The political plan for Venezuela took stage in the streets of Washington DC February 15, 2014. Passers-by on Georgetown’s 30^th Street on a freezing Saturday were perplexed at the standoff between two groups assuming opposite sides of the street. One ethnically mixed group of mostly Latino, Black, and White had taken the side of the street in front of the Venezuelan Embassy to show solidarity with Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution. The group on the other side was the all white, privileged youth of the Venezuelan elite residing in the U.S. who want to see their country’s return to the days when they dominated the economic and political process.

The latter are hoping that the recent unrest in their country signals the end of the Bolivarian process and the overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, successor to the late President Hugo Chavez. The protest they staged at the Embassy was to help this become so.

The current situation started in Venezuela February 12, 2014 with violence perpetrated against the democratically elected government and civilians resulting in three deaths, 61 persons wounded and 69 detained. This followed what were, for the most part, peaceful marches marking the 200th anniversary of the battle of La Victoria, in which students played a critical role in a victory against royalist forces during Venezuela’s war of independence. Some student groups marched in celebration of the Day of the Student but violent anti-government demonstrators used the occasion to protest episodic shortages of some basic goods, persistent crime, and to demand the release of students who had been arrested in earlier demonstrations.

“In Merida… opposition students and youth, some armed, marched through the city centre and protested outside the state government building, and another small march was held in the nearby town of Ejido. Marchers chanted ‘Maduro resign now!’”

“Observers told Venezuelanalysis.com that they witnessed opposition protestors firing live ammunition indiscriminately into buildings, throwing rocks and attempting to storm a communal house in the city centre.”

“Violent anti-government demonstrators used the occasion to protest episodic shortages of some basic goods, persistent crime, and to demand the release of students who had been arrested in earlier demonstrations.”

While the Obama Administration and capitalist news media want everyone to believe a repressive Venezuelan government is attacking peaceful protests, there are videos of protestors using fire and rocks against the police. The Merida state governor, Alexis Ramirez released a photo on twitter showing one of the armed protestors. “The governor also alleged that one student who had been arrested claimed that he had been paid 150 bolivars by far right opposition leader, Villca Fernandez to protest. Almost all students protesting wore balaclavas.”

This is the general blueprint used for essentially the same brand of regime change in Libya adapted for Venezuela. Particulars between the two countries may be different but this general strategy of U.S. imperialism is the same. Imperialism uses hidden hands to instigate incidents in countries that take anti-imperialist stands. Then it uses its media and official spokespersons to make things look to the rest of the world as if they are other than they are, demonizing the actual victims.

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said at a February 14^th press briefing, “So we are deeply concerned by rising tensions, by the violence surrounding these February 12^th protests, and by the issuance of a warrant for the arrest of opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez. We join the Secretary General of the OAS in condemning the violence and calling on authorities to investigate and bring to justice those responsible for the deaths of peaceful protestors. We also call on the Venezuelan Government to release the 19 detained protestors and urge all parties to work to restore calm and refrain from violence.”

To claim in the same statement that they are concerned for opposition leader Lopez and 19 detained protestors, yet call on the Venezuela Government to bring to justice those responsible shows that the U.S. is up to it same old covert shenanigans. The public is not suppose to consider that bringing those responsible for the violence to justice likely means arresting Leopoldo Lopez, the ultra-right wing leader of the Voluntad Popular party who played a role in the short-lived coup against former President Hugo Chavez in 2002 and who now has been calling for intensified demonstrations and the “exit” of Maduro from the government.

“Imperialism uses hidden hands to instigate incidents in countries that take anti-imperialist stands.”

Before going into hiding Lopez insisted that his intention is to lead peaceful protests. President Maduro has accused Lopez of trying to instigate violence in a bid to mount a coup.

Don DeBar of Community Progressive Radio in New York reported “Maduro and other senior government officials said the violence was centered with small groups operating according to a plan which was being managed by Lopez with the assistance of a handful of other opposition figures. According to a report from Informativa Pacifica, the plan was organized in Mexico and included a current mayor of a Venezuelan city, who is also a close friend of former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe Velez.

A recording of a telephone conversation surfaced that appears to show two former right wing officials discussing or planning the implementation of the violence Wednesday, a day before it began. The two former officials – Fernando Gerbasi and Mario Carratu Molina – compared what was to come to April 11, a reference to the beginning of the 2002 coup attempt against former President Hugo Chavez, that was ultimately defeated by a massive popular uprising in defense of the socialist government.”

The day things kicked off I was asked by a couple people, "What's going on in Venezuela?" One added "Twitter ablaze with reports of protests, military crackdown, deaths, etc in Venezuela...anyone know what's going on?" It is important to know and understand the machinations of imperialism so we are never caught off guard or fooled by its modus operandi or its propaganda.

It has perfected this regime change strategy of causing unrest in places to get the target government in question to react with violent repression. Then fanning social media and news media reports that accuse and depict said government of being the aggressor in the hope it can maneuver things toward their ultimate goal. Over the last decade or so we have seen this strategy attempted in Zimbabwe, Libya, Iran, and Syria.

“Countries like Zimbabwe have so far been able to fend off such assaults.”

So, “what is going on in Venezuela” is the typical attempts by neo-colonial, imperialist backed forces inside a country to seize power by destabilizing the country away from its revolutionary path and if possible create a pretext for more direct imperialist intervention. We see it over and over again in countries taking an anti-imperialist stand and asserting their sovereign right to national self-determination. Countries like Zimbabwe have so far been able to fend off such assaults. Others like Libya were not successful.

Had counter demonstrators not been in Washington standing in solidarity with Venezuela’s Bolivarian Government, surely the media spin of what took place would have been different. It would have been one of a traumatized Venezuelan exile community desperately seeking justice and the restraint of the needlessly violent government.

Instead the coddled class of Venezuelans showed their true selves and how much of the disposition they share in common with those of them back home who can’t civilly accept the progressive course democratically chosen by the masses in their country.

Switching between Spanish and English but speaking most times in Spanish, that day they yelled racist insults at the demonstrators, raised middle fingers at us, and implied that we were homeless people getting paid to be there. “Go back to your shelter!” and “How much are they paying you? Come over to our side and we’ll pay you double.”

To them it is difficult to understand that there can be any other reason for so many people who were not Venezuelan to be there without the more selfish and superficial interests that motivate them. They are unable to understand the selflessness of revolutionary and humanist convictions. And they also called us "communistos" with the same fanatical contempt that a racist would call someone the "N" word. Evidently the Bolivarian revolution evokes from them the same crude regard and understanding of communism as propagated during the "Cold War" era.

“They yelled racist insults at the demonstrators.”

This right-wing is now planning another protest at the Organization of American States for Wednesday, February 19, 2014, the other part of an inside-outside strategy. The success of their strategy depends largely on the public swallowing their hype and lies.

When we think for ourselves about Venezuela what is obvious is that, “It stretches the bounds of credibility to argue that the government would seek to destabilize itself when it has come out the winner in two important elections (presidential and municipal), has made reducing violence and crime a top priority, has recently met with opposition mayors to find ground on which to cooperate, and seeks a peaceful implementation of the government’s six year plan (Plan de la Patria).”

This is not to mention the popularity the government has earned from providing universal healthcare, education, and processes of participatory democracy not seen in most parts of the world.

There is a real chance to make sure Venezuela does not go the way of Libya by thinking for ourselves, equipping others with the information to do the same, then taking a stand against U.S. imperialism against Venezuela.

Netfa Freeman is a long time human rights and Pan-African activists, and a radio co-producer/co-host for Voices with Vision on WPFW 89.3 FM in Washington, DC.

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